An Amazon Fraud Mystery

March 20, 2025 11:28 AM

It looks like mom's Amazon was hacked, and we've frozen her credit card, but how did these acquaintances end up involved?

I got a call from the woman who employs my elderly mom's caregivers, concerned because a caregiver for mom years ago had gotten a text saying an Amazon package would be arriving at her house with a bracelet ($30) paid for by mom's credit card (with the correct last four digits). When I looked in mom's amazon account I didn't see any orders in the last 3 months, but that credit card was listed in her account. When I looked at mom's credit card online I didn't see a charge, but when I called the credit card, they did find the charge pending, so we put a freeze on her card. I changed mom's amazon password, presuming she'd been hacked. The caregiver did receive the bracelet that night.

We all found it odd that the caregiver was sent the bracelet - she hasn't worked for mom in years, her address was not in mom's amazon addresses, mom likely didn't know her address, few people would associate the two. The caregiver was obviously concerned that we would suspect her and offered to return the bracelet, pay for it, give it to us. If she wanted to steal she didn't have to alert us, she could have stolen from much richer patients, and it was a very long con. I don't suspect her.

When I went to check the addresses in mom's amazon the two most recent addresses (I think, they were last) were ones I didn't recognize: a local church (not hers) and an unfamiliar man with a distinctive name in Tucson. When I googled him I found his obituary from 2005. I figured maybe the fraudsters were using a dead man's identity for packages (though again, I found no orders in mom's amazon to him or anyone). But I did note that the obit said he'd once lived in Buffalo, as had my family (50+ years ago).

So I asked mom, and she said that yes, he had been in the church choir with mom and dad 50+ years ago, and she remembered a distinctive detail that was noted in his obit. She said he was nice, but our family had not kept in touch at all with his in the last 50 years.

I called Amazon with the order number (provided by the caregiver), but they can't tell you anything unless you have the email of the person who placed the order. I guess I should have tried providing mom's email in case they used her account but somehow hid the order?

I got an email from mom's credit card that a new $99 charge from Amazon was pending, and we agreed that it was fraud, and they've closed that account number. So I don't think there's any more we need to do to protect mom's finances at the moment. But the weird mystery of these two distant acquaintances being involved is nagging at us all. Does anyone have any ideas on what might have happened or how we might find out more?

posted by ldthomps to Work & Money (12 answers total)

Is your mom capable of making purchases on Amazon? Because my first thought here would be that you are looking at an emerging memory issue.
posted by moosetracks at 11:53 AM on March 20 [5 favorites]

You can "archive" an order from your Amazon account, which will prevent it from showing in some places. But I think the more likely explanation is a second Amazon account with the credit card number.

Amazon is not likely to be helpful in resolving this. Earlier this year Amazon UK was charging my card for Prime, even though I have only ever lived in the US. I ended up having to cancel the card due to their pigheadedness.
posted by wnissen at 12:15 PM on March 20 [2 favorites]

Might your mom's social media or email have been compromised? Perhaps she was friends with both people on Facebook, or had them in her email (Gmail, Hotmail, whatever) address book?

Any time something like this happens, make sure to change not only your Amazon password, but the password for any email accounts associated with your Amazon account. Also probably a good idea to thoroughly scan her computer for malware, see if there are any suspicious browser add-ons, etc.
posted by xedrik at 12:44 PM on March 20 [4 favorites]

I was going to say the archived orders too -- go to Returns & Orders at the top, then click on the dropdown next to "X orders placed in" and choose Archived Orders. The fact there are unknown addresses on the account makes me quite sure it is her Amazon account that's compromised. (That's not to say nothing else has been compromised, but the account wouldn't have spontaneously added addresses to itself.)

Did you remove the card from her Amazon account after the first charge? If not that explains the second charge. Though if the card was frozen, it should have automatically declined it, no?
posted by tubedogg at 1:22 PM on March 20 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: Mom sometimes has memory blips (but never of such consequence, more what the weather forecast was), has no social media, and I make all of her purchases on Amazon / do her email for her. I did check her archived orders, thank you for that - there's nothing there. And I have now updated her email passwords, too, thanks for that!
posted by ldthomps at 3:14 PM on March 20

The acquaintances addresses in her Amazon account could have been lurking there for decades, nothing was sent to them recently, I think you can ignore. Amazon does delete order history after about 10 years, so it is possible they were used a long time ago.

This one detail jumps out of your description: "offered to return the bracelet, pay for it, give it to us"
Why would someone offer to _pay_ for an item that's been fraudulently delivered to their address unless they are feeling some kind of guilt associated with this whole thing?

Now I could be wrong, but my guess is that this person had your mom's card details for some, possibly innocuous reason and then years later in a moment of weakness they (or perhaps their partner) decided to try the most basic fraud imaginable by just sending something to their own address. After sobering up the next day they realised this is all very traceable back to them and are spinning for a way to undo it.

Also the care giver described this as a $30 bracelet but the Amazon charge was $99, unless the postage was $70 something doesn't add up.
A lot of criminal activity is the result of really really dumb decisions.
posted by Lanark at 3:37 PM on March 20

This is fascinating. Love a good mefi-collaborative Mystery Solve!

"Caregiver for mom years ago had gotten a text saying an Amazon package would be arriving at her house with a bracelet ($30) paid for by mom's credit card (with the correct last four digits)."

This sounds fishy to me. I don't have text notifications turned on, but the email shipping notifications contain much less info than this. The order total price is there, the first name of the recipient, the city the recipient is in, and links to login to the account to view the order and to track the shipping. (And a request to keep shopping for other items I recently viewed).

Nothing about what the item is, nothing about the credit card number, not even the complete address it's going to.

Maybe texts are different, but I'm definitely suspicious of the caregiver (Occam's razer). I think Lanark has it. Once she regretted doing the thing, she (poorly) attempted damage control. Caregiver used the credit card to purchase items from her own Amazon account - that's why the credit card company shows the charge pending but Mom's amazon account doesn't show the order.

Or instead of the caregiver herself, it could have been somebody in her family, and she's panicking and trying to course correct. But who really knows.

It doesn't explain the other addresses though, if they're even related. Could Mom have used Amazon to send flowers to the funeral back in 2005 or something? And something like that for the church as well?

My only theory tying the addresses in: caregiver had the amazon login and credit card back in 2005, for some innocent reason, and maybe (?) your mom received a funeral announcement for the dead guy back then. Or something that the caregiver could find linking him and mom. As a test, caregiver (or associate) uses the account to purchase something small sent to the dead guy and to the church, which they thought might look plausible as done by your mom to a family member reviewing the records. Then they just ... stopped, for some reason, until this week when they decided to see if the same credit card still worked?

Did mom's credit card number change since this caregiver stopped working for your mom?
Did mom's amazon password change during that time?
posted by bluesky78987 at 5:13 PM on March 20

Yeah, I think the two addresses are red herrings. Amazon definitely does not send texts with the item description (bracelet) or last 4 cc digits. And how would the ex-caretaker know that those 4 digits were the last 4 of your mom’s card anyway? Nothing about this ex-caretaker’s story makes sense. So I think they used your mom’s card from their own Amazon account.
posted by whitelily at 11:32 PM on March 20 [3 favorites]

I agree with those who have said that this was attempted (and then regretted) fraud by the former caregiver or someone in their household. Amazon does not include cc digits in texts about upcoming deliveries. They don’t send texts to recipients when the recipient is not the person who placed the order. Even when you receive Amazon order from someone else, there will not be anything indicating the person who ordered it unless they included a gift note. (We’ve received presents before and had to ask around to find the sender because the gift note got left out.) The caregiver should not have had any way of recognizing the last 4 digits of the cc number. Even if they had been responsible for paying bills using your mom’s card at the time, they should not have the cc number still on hand years later.
posted by tdismukes at 6:53 AM on March 21 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: Hmm. Maybe caretaker had mom's cc in her Amazon from 4 years ago for some reason (I could see mom asking someone to order something when she first got caregivers, now she has me do it). The caregiver forwarded the amazon text with the order number on it, but of course when I clicked on it, it wanted a login so I couldn't see more. It's weird that she called us in a panic about it, and then there was a second Amazon order a couple days later After that for $99. But Occam's Razor does say that it likely came from her.

Guy in Tucson and the church in mom's Amazon account still make zero sense, but I guess I'll just have to live that. Mom never had his Buffalo address even in her (still extent) card file, hadn't spoken to or of his family since 1974, had no idea dude moved to Tucson, he died before mom even Had an Amazon account. So weird, but life is!
posted by ldthomps at 10:31 AM on March 21

> It's weird that she called us in a panic about it, and then there was a second Amazon order a couple days later After that for $99.

It's possible that two orders were placed at the same time and the $99 one was delayed in shipping. From my recollection, Amazon does not place an authorization for the order until it's actually in the shipping process (not at order placement, like some places do).

> Amazon does delete order history after about 10 years, so it is possible they were used a long time ago.

Just to make clear for anyone else reading this: No, they don't. I have orders on my account dating to 1998, and the year dropdown goes to 1995. The orders in 1998 say "Delayed, not shipped," and I definitely received (and still have some of) the items, so it's not 100% accurate, but some semblance of it is there.

> Also the care giver described this as a $30 bracelet but the Amazon charge was $99, unless the postage was $70 something doesn't add up.

The second Amazon charge was $99, not the one for the bracelet.
posted by tubedogg at 10:50 AM on March 21 [2 favorites]

Just checked my Amazon account and you are right the old orders are there, but I swear a couple of years ago that wasn't the case, so maybe they restored them at some point.
posted by Lanark at 2:44 PM on March 21